Finally, a Garden Update

I finally got around to taking some pictures of the garden this evening so I could give you all an update on how it is doing. I get asked a lot about it so here are some pictures so you can see for yourself. The plants got a little beat up by the hail the other day but not to bad.
Let me start off by saying that I am really liking the no till, raised bed gardening that I decided to do. This is my second year of doing it and I am very pleased so far. I think it is less work than conventional gardening but am not sure how much less work it is. I definitely think it is much better overall. The soil is better and the plants seem to do much better. My soil is really good, fertile, loose and not all packed down. The mulched leaves I use on the beds to keep weeds down also keep the soil moist when it gets dry in the summer and they compost really well into the soil. The beds being raised shed the water if there is to much rain like there has been this spring so the plants don't get bogged down.

One indicator of good soil and a good garden is earthworms because they like to be where good soil is so the more worms you have the better soil you have and the worms work like little tillers turning the soil and breaking up organic matter and increasing soil fertility. So tonight, I was shoveling some soil from one of the beds and here is what I saw, and no, these pictures weren't set up this is just a shovel full of dirt I just scooped up. Worms were everywhere.





This is the corn and Margo's leg.


Here is the squash and zucchini


zucchini


sugar snap peas (Margo looks like a hippie)


tomatoes


green beans


And this is the overall view